


Five Things Neil Was Surprised To Enjoy

by moonix



Category: All For the Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Neil deserves nice things, Neil plays Neko Atsume, Nicky ships it, The foxes just want Neil to be happy, ice-cream, lowkey boyfriend hoodies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-07
Updated: 2016-10-07
Packaged: 2018-08-20 02:52:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8233532
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonix/pseuds/moonix
Summary: Five things Neil was surprised to enjoy, and one thing he wasn't surprised to discover he still didn't.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I don't think there are any obvious trigger warnings for this fic, though it takes place after King's Men and there are some mentions of Neil's time on the run. If you have any questions before reading, feel free to ask me!
> 
> This is my first contribution to this amazing fandom. I'm not entirely happy with it, but I haven't written anything for a new fandom in years, so this is just a little exploratory piece. I hope you like it anyways.
> 
> My bestie was kind enough to give this a read-through and pointed out that you can't actually rename the cats in Neko Atsume, so either Wikipedia lied to me or they've updated the game since. I'm just going to pretend Neil renames them all anyway because, cats.

1 Dancing

“You said you didn't swing, then you swung for Andrew. You said you didn't drink, I just watched you down five shots without batting an eye. Excuse me if I find it harder to believe every time you say you don't do something.” Nicky counted off three fingers and waggled them in Neil's face. He was drunk, but not so drunk he couldn't stand, and there was a gleam in his eye like some of the black glitter on his face had got lost in his irises. “Up you get,” he commanded, “your grace period's up, Josten.”

“He said no.” Andrew's voice was flat and low like usual, and there was no sign of irritation on his face, but something turned sour in the air between them and Neil was having none of it tonight.

“It's alright,” he said mildly. Getting to his feet was harder than he'd anticipated, though once he'd found his feet, his muscles throbbed pleasantly at being released from their hunched over position against the wall. “I think I'll give it a go. You good here?”

Nicky whooped and Andrew didn't look at him. Neil wasn't expecting an answer and let Nicky lead him down to the crowded dance floor. His head was fuzzy from the alcohol and the music, and the bass felt like a live thing in his chest, humming deep in his bones. Nathaniel Wesninski didn't dance, he'd never had a reason to and clubs were high on his mother's list of places to avoid at all costs. Neil Josten, however, had experiences to catch up on, and one of those was, apparently, grinding his hips to Apple Bottom Jeans with Nicky Hemmick.

“Damn, Neil,” Nicky leaned close to shout over the music, then he threw his head back and laughed. “ _Damn_.”

Neil found himself grinning back. Something shook loose in his stomach and bubbled up his throat like fizzy champagne. It was easy to mimic Nicky, to watch the people around him and note how they moved to the music, find little quirks he could adopt. He'd always been good at blending in, and the crowd swallowed him up willingly. Occasionally, someone would try to engage him, but Neil kept close to Nicky, who made sure no one got ideas. It was weirdly touching how protective he was now, considering that the first time Neil had been to Eden's Twilight, it had been Nicky himself who'd put his mouth on him uninvited.

Neil felt someone behind him before Nicky had a chance to warn him, close enough to make his skin prickle but not quite touching yet. Nicky's mouth hardened into a smirk when he saw who it was, but in that moment, Neil already knew.

“Joining us?” Neil asked cheekily, letting his head drop back until it rested against Andrew's shoulder. Andrew's face was still blank, but his hands hovered just above Neil's hipbones like unfinished question marks, and Neil took them and tugged them down.

“Would it stop you making a fool of yourself?” Andrew asked, something vaguely long-suffering in his tone. “I got bored watching you shake your ass at other people.”

“What if I shook my ass at you instead,” Neil grinned, wiggling his hips around for demonstration in Andrew's grip, which turned bruising in the space of a second. Nicky had retreated a few paces to give them space, but he was watching with a gleeful expression, and winked when Neil caught his eye.

“You're drunk,” Andrew growled into his ear.

“Just tipsy,” Neil shrugged.

“Regardless,” Andrew murmured, hot breath ghosting over Neil's neck and making him shiver. Neil's head on Andrew's shoulder and Andrew's hands on Neil's hipbones were still the only points of contact between them. “I don't fuck drunk people. So you can stop right now.”

“You think I'm doing this to get laid?” Neil grinned and twisted his hips out of Andrew's grip to turn around. “I'm having fun. You can stay and do some ass-shaking of your own, or you can go back to your vantage point and watch me do it at other people. Your call.”

He didn't wait for Andrew's answer and turned his back on him to start dancing again, but he was sure something like triumph showed on his face when Andrew's hands reappeared over his waist.

“Yes or no?”

“ _Yes_ , Andrew,” Neil shouted, leaning back until they were flush. Andrew's thumbs hooked into his belt loops, and Neil swayed his hips experimentally from side to side, thrilled when Andrew followed.

He didn't need to look up to see Nicky gaping at them, and barely stifled his laugh when Andrew swore against the side of his neck.

 

2 Neko Atsume

“...and then you can buy more shit to attract more cats,” Allison was saying, shoving Neil's new phone back at him. She had installed several games on it in the ten minutes she'd had it in her hands, insisting Neil definitely needed all of them, and the others had all chimed in with suggestions of their own. Neil himself still felt vaguely puzzled by the whole concept, as he'd never had a smartphone, let alone used phones for anything other than the bare minimum of absolutely unavoidable communication.

“Look, you already have a visitor,” Renee said gently, pointing at a small round cat that had appeared in the virtual garden on Neil's phone. “You can take a picture of it and give it a new name, if you want.”

Two hours later, Neil was running out of cat names and his eyes were sore from staring at his screen for so long. Nicky had taken to randomly calling out ridiculous suggestions for names, and Dan was propped up against Neil's side, her feet in Matt's lap, playing Candy Crush Saga on Allison's phone. It was strangely peaceful.

“Junkie.”

Neil looked up at Andrew's low voice behind him, blinking away the after-image of Princess Toebeans playing with a ball. Andrew was leaning over the back of the sofa, hands in the pocket of his hoodie, and it took Neil a few moments to realise that the nondescript black hoodie was actually one of his own.

“Interesting,” Neil muttered under his breath, careful not to draw Dan's attention away from her game. Andrew gave him a scathing look.

“I forgot to do laundry. It was either that or my jersey, and as much of an eyesore as your fashion sense is, orange is infinitely worse.”

“If you say so,” Neil grinned, turning back to his phone. “Junkie,” he added under his breath, and earned himself a little shove in the back of the head.

 

3 Milkshakes

Vegetables aside, Neil wasn't picky about what he ate. He'd had to make do with whatever he and his mother had had on hand while on the run, and she'd hit him if he refused to eat something that was still edible or complained too much about what she'd procured for them. Later, after her death, Neil had simply adopted those habits, and if he ate sweets, it was because they were easy to get and take with him, or when he needed a quick energy boost and didn't have anything else, though he still preferred dried fruit and trail mix to actual candy. Nicky maintained that the reason Neil didn't like sweets was because he was too full of salt, which Neil had made the mistake of protesting only minutes before he went on a long-winded rant about the Jackals' propensity for fouls, pretty much proving Nicky's point. These days, Neil went to the athletes' dining hall for lunch, and feeding himself was first and foremost a part of his fitness routine, which was a step up from the necessary evil it had been before, but still a long way from real enjoyment, and sweets were rarely on his menu, no matter how much sugary junk food Andrew stockpiled in their suite.

“Josten,” Kevin hissed, cornering him in the kitchen with a half-eaten protein bar in one hand and his headphones dangling from the other. “You need to do something about your boyfriend's diet. He's been eating nothing but ice-cream all day and I'm going to be sick. Coach is going to kick him off the team if he keeps this up.”

“He's not my lap dog,” Neil said flatly, taking a bite out of the apple he'd picked. “He can eat whatever the fuck he wants.”

Kevin made a frustrated sound and threw his hands up in the air with a look of disgust before stalking out to get his laptop and keys. A moment later, the door to their suite slammed shut behind him, and Neil calmly finished his apple, then went and locked the door behind him.

“Kevin's worried about your sugar intake,” he told Andrew, sinking into the bean bag chair next to Andrew's. There was an empty carton of cookie dough ice-cream on the floor, and Andrew was sucking absent-mindedly on his spoon, his eyes on the television screen, though the sound was turned off.

“I don't know what he's complaining about. I had a salad last week,” Andrew hummed, slipping the spoon out of his mouth with a soft  _ pop _ . Neil followed the movement with his eyes, his head tilted back against the sofa cushions, and felt a sleepy, heavy sort of warmth pool in his belly.

“Andrew,” he murmured. “Yes or no?”

Andrew considered the spoon in his hand, then tossed it back into the empty carton and turned his head to look at Neil.

“Yes.”

When they kissed, Andrew's mouth was cold and sweet, a lazy, familiar swirl of chocolate and vanilla on Neil's tongue. The warmth in his belly unfurled, creeping up through his chest and down his limbs until Neil felt soft and pliant all over. Andrew cupped his hand around the back of his head, but apart from that, they stayed separate, and Neil wanted to sink into the kiss and never move again.

The next day, when the upperclassmen dragged him along for dinner with them, Neil surprised himself by ordering a chocolate milkshake. He wrapped his hands around the cool glass and leaned back in his seat, burrowing deeper into his hoodie and sucking slowly on his straw, mouth filled to the brim with cold chocolatey sweetness and the memory of Andrew kissing him until his head swam and his lips were sore.

He ordered a second milkshake and nearly gave himself brain freeze, not missing the contemplative look Renee gave him, but choosing to whole-heartedly ignore it.

After a lifetime of rationing, he figured he was allowed to have some sweet things every once in a while.

 

4 Karaoke

It was Allison's idea. They were all gathered in the girls' dorm, spread out across a sofa and some cushions and bean bag chairs on the floor, and Neil was tired enough that Andrew had curled his hand around the back of his head and pulled it down into his lap without a word. There'd been a few significant looks when the others had noticed, but no one had dared to say anything yet, not even Nicky, and Neil let his eyes drift shut for a bit, listening to Matt's awful rendition of an ancient Britney Spears song and smiling to himself.

“Neil.”

He jerked at the sound of his name and struggled to make his heavy eyelids come unstuck all the way. A different song was on, and Andrew was squinting down at him in the dim light of the room. Neil swallowed against the dryness in his mouth and rubbed his eyes before pushing himself up into a slumped sitting position.

“I fell asleep?” he mumbled.

“I have to piss,” Andrew said, which meant _yes, but I would have let you sleep if not for that_. Neil obediently scooted back so Andrew could get up. Stifling a yawn in his hand, Neil watched Andrew's back as he walked to the bathroom. He was wearing a black sweatshirt that hung loosely on his broad shoulders and his armbands peeked out from under his rolled-up sleeves. The hair at the nape of his neck was mussed from where he'd leaned his head against the sofa. It looked unbearably soft, and Neil barely noticed the sigh escaping his lips when Andrew glanced back as if feeling his eyes on him. His eyebrow gave a brief twitch of detached amusement, then the bathroom door closed behind him, and Neil sighed again and buried his face in a cushion.

“You two are fucking nauseating,” said a dry voice at his side, and Neil raised his head to glare at Allison, who was smirking. “Don't give me that look, Josten, it's written all over your face. Better get that under control before he comes back. And wipe that drool off.”

“Fuck you,” Neil muttered, but gave his chin a furtive little wipe when she looked away, just in case there _was_ any.

“It's your turn, by the way,” Allison said casually, then pointed at the television. “You're up with Renee.”

Renee waved at him from where she was standing with two of the microphones in her hands, and Neil shook his head to clear it of the sleepy fog he was still in. “I don't really know any songs,” he admitted sheepishly, but Allison only shrugged.

“Just read the lyrics off the screen and you'll be good,” she told him, then gave him a little push. “Or make up your own. Go, lover boy. Can't let your man find you moping over his absence.”

She winked, and Neil pulled himself to his feet with a sigh. He went over to Renee and accepted one of the microphones, and together they scrolled through a selection of songs, until Neil's gaze snagged on Runaway Train, which he knew now was what Andrew had programmed into his phone as his ringtone.

“That one,” he said, mouth twitching against his will. Renee shot him a sideways look, smiled at what she saw, and nodded.

“Okay.”

Neil had his back to the bathroom door, so he couldn't see Andrew's expression when he came back and he and Renee were just starting on the first few lines of the song. He knew it wouldn't give anything away, anyway, but Neil couldn't keep the small grin off his face all the way through the song, and had to hide it in Andrew's thigh when Andrew pulled him down into his lap once again. There were cheers and applause from the others, and Neil had a feeling they weren't just acknowledging his mediocre performance at karaoke, though if Andrew noticed, he didn't let on.

 

5 Hot baths

Neil had never understood the point of having a bath when you could have a shower. A shower was something functional, a necessity, and sometimes a way to unwind and catch his breath after a game or a long run, but he didn't enjoy them any more or less than he enjoyed warm-ups or brushing his teeth. It was Kevin who bullied him into taking a bath at Abby's house after a particularly gruelling practice session, when Neil was lying cramped up on Abby's kitchen floor trying to stretch out the muscles in his legs that kept seizing up.

“I'm fine,” Neil told him through gritted teeth, and Kevin only shot him a disgusted look and shook his head before disappearing to run him a bath anyway.

“He's right, you know,” Abby smiled down at him, just before taking a hold of his ankle and pushing down on the sole of his foot to stretch his calf the rest of the way. Neil swore at the pain and breathed heavily through his nose for a few endless moments before the cramp finally started to subside. “You need to take better care of yourself, Neil.”

“I'm  _ fine _ ,” Neil said again, easing his leg out of Abby's grip and catching his breath. “Thanks.”

“Did I just hear Neil's dulcet tones, insisting he was fine?” Nicky stuck his head inside the door, then whistled when he saw Neil on the floor with Abby standing over him, looking unsympathetic. Before he could say something inappropriate, Kevin came back to tell Neil that his bath was ready, and Neil let Kevin pull him to his feet with a sigh and shoo him to the bathroom just to escape Nicky's lewd eyebrow waggling.

He couldn't quite avoid hearing Nicky contemplating whether or not to get Andrew so he could give Neil a massage, but if Nicky really thought that was a good idea, Neil was going to let him walk into that particular knife on his own.

The water was hot enough to make Neil hiss when he lowered himself into the tub, but it was a good kind of pain, and his muscles gradually began to unlock. Kevin had poured something herbal-smelling into the water and Neil inhaled deeply, letting the steam roll off his face and leaning his head back against the edge of the tub. Abby's bathroom had a skylight, though the stars were obscured by dark clouds tonight. Neil watched them push their slow way across the sky like fat grey snails and let his eyes drift closed. He was home. He was safe. He could stay. He had a reason to stay, and they were all downstairs, eating Abby's lasagne and fighting over the remote or bickering over a recent bet.

He would be okay.

 

+1 Getting drunk

“You're drunk.”

Neil blinked at the hazy outline of Andrew crouching in front of him. It was late – probably – and that observation didn't make sense to him, because everyone was drunk, except for Andrew, but that was a given. Neil clumsily tugged his limbs closer to himself, but lost a leg somewhere in the process, which slid sideways and had to be retrieved with the help of his hands.

“Stupid foot,” Neil mumbled, scowling down at his wayward ankle. “Running away and shit. Stay here.”

“This is almost entertaining,” Andrew said, sounding bored. Neil waved this off a little too violently, then caught his wrist in his other hand and tucked it safely against his chest.

“It is not,” he said, a laborious process of word-making and enunciating clearly. “I'm not entertained. I am negative entertained. Being drink, drinking a being, drunk, being drunk, is shit, I feel like, that. Shit.”

“I'm starting to see why you paid someone to knock you out the last time this happened,” Andrew mused, his head leaning to one side like a bird's. Neil tried to mimic the gesture so that Andrew's face would be upright again, but he overbalanced and fell to the floor. Nausea rolled abruptly in his stomach like a summer storm, and Neil wanted to tell Andrew that he felt sick, but only managed something that sounded like “guh”.

“What's this, what's this,” someone said, stopping next to Andrew and leaning down to inspect the misery that was Neil on the floor. “Bless. Is he drunk?”

“Yes,” Neil said, because Andrew didn't, “he's very.”

“Intriguing,” Nicky said, which was too long and weird a word for Neil to pry apart and make sense of in his head. “Somehow I always thought a drunk Neil would be just like a sober Neil, except even more ready to fight and run that smart mouth of his.”

“Idiot,” Andrew snorted softly. It was a good sound, and Neil hummed into the carpet, treasuring it. Nicky looked away from Neil to Andrew, and there was something melty and icky in his eyes, like ice-cream, except with pity. Neil didn't like it, but Andrew was still watching him and ignoring Nicky, so it was almost okay.

“Of course,” Nicky finally nodded. He poked Neil's arm with his index finger and Neil shivered into himself like a shrinking violet. “Should've known he'd be cute and harmless. Look at his little face.”

“Don't touch him,” Andrew snapped, and Neil made a high-pitched whiny noise in the back of his throat. He didn't want Andrew to snap. He wanted Andrew to be calm, and safe, and okay, and somewhere no one could ever harm him again. He wanted to look at Andrew's perfect beautiful hands forever.

“But he's so soft and precious,” Nicky crooned, laughing, and Andrew had to punch Nicky's leg very hard to make him go away. “Ugh, fine, possessive bastard,” Nicky grumbled, and Andrew looked mutinous for a moment, but smoothed back out into calm and steady when he caught Neil watching him. Neil started breathing again and squeezed his eyes shut in a slow blink a few times, like Renee had taught him to do with the stray cat on campus, to show that he meant no harm. Andrew wasn't a cat, of course, but he thought it couldn't hurt to try.

“Something in your eye?” Andrew asked, unimpressed. Neil was distracted by how nice and deep and lovely his voice was and forgot the question. He continued to lie on the floor for five minutes or five hours, and then he took a deep breath and pushed himself up onto his elbows. Immediately, the world tilted out of focus and the nausea came back.

“I don't like this,” he whined, pawing at the carpet and holding his head with one hand.

“It's your own fault,” Andrew informed him. Neil nodded and clutched tighter at his head.

“Mom's gonna kill me,” he mumbled, feeling cold sweat on his back when his shirt shifted against his skin. He froze and squinted at the crosshatch of scars on the back of his hand. “No. That's not right.” He couldn't remember how, though, and then he forgot what he'd said in the first place, and then there were hands under his arms, pulling him up.

“I am taking you to your bed,” Andrew said. “If you throw up on me, I will leave you outside in the hall to choke.”

“Nooo,” Neil whimpered, “I don't wanna throw up. Andrew? I don't wanna throw up on you.”

“Good to know,” Andrew said, low and steady. He smelled like good things and milkshakes and Neil was very careful not to put his face on him, because Andrew didn't like being touched, and Neil was already breaking the rules by letting Andrew lead him to the door. To be on the safe side, Neil wiggled his right hand into his left sleeve and then his left hand into his right sleeve, gripping his arms, which kept him occupied until they were in their dorm.

“Mmsleep,” Neil sighed, stumbling towards the sofa, but Andrew pulled him away and to their bedroom. “Sleep?” Neil inquired tremulously once Andrew had let him sit down on the edge of his bunk. Was it his bunk? They were all the same, but it was important that Neil remember, except he couldn't.

“Sleep,” Andrew told him quietly, and Neil flopped face-first into the pillows and made an irritated sound when his shirt slid up to expose bare skin to cool air. Something caught the hem and tugged it back down, and then the mattress dipped and swayed, and Neil looked up and saw that Andrew had settled himself cross-legged against the wall by his feet.

“Hmnn?”

“Sleep,” Andrew said again, fishing a phone from the upper bunk with his pretty, pretty hands. Neil couldn't tell if it was his or Andrew's, because they both had the same phone, and that was good, that was reassuring.

“Meow,” Neil said, batting at the pillow under his chin to make it flatter.

“I'm going to remodel your garden,” Andrew told him, tapping on his phone. The light from the screen made his face look softer than usual, and even though Neil was aware that he was staring again, Andrew didn't tell him to stop even once.

“Mmkay,” Neil murmured at last, and put his face back in the pillow. “Don't scare off my cats.”


End file.
